High power continuous wave microwave test bench at 4.6 GHz for experimental advanced superconducting tokamak

The lower hybrid current drive (LHCD) is an effective approach for auxiliary heating and non-inductive current drive in the experimental advanced superconducting tokamak. The 6 MW/4.6 GHz LHCD system is being designed and installed with twenty-four 250 KW/4.6 GHz high power klystron amplifiers. The test bench operating at 250 KW/4.6 GHz in continuous wave mode has been set up, which can test and train microwave components for the 6 MW/4.6 GHz LHCD system. In this paper, the system architecture and software of the microwave test bench are presented. Moreover, the test results of these klystrons and microwave units are described here in detail. The long term operation of the test bench and improved performance of all microwave component samples indicated that the related technologies on test bench can be applied in the large scale LHCD systems.